


Madness

by howardently



Category: My Mad Fat Diary
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-21
Updated: 2016-01-21
Packaged: 2018-05-15 06:50:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,883
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5775793
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/howardently/pseuds/howardently
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Our love is madness.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Madness

It’s their third fight this month. The other two had been bad enough, but this one… Rae’d screamed at him, “It’s over!” where she’d stood framed in the hallway. He’d yelled back, “Great!” and slammed the door on his way out. The car door, too, for good measure.

It’s not really over, of course. It’s never really over between them. There’s always the apologies and the dance and the tension. The whole flat has been filled with tension for weeks now, creeping around like a sickly fog, clogging up otherwise normal stuff. It’d start as a conversation about dinner and end up with them both hungry, sulking in separate rooms, his head spinning as he tried to figure out how things had got so wildly out of control.

He’s got a place where he goes, when it gets to be too much. When he can’t stand the air in their flat, or the echoes, or the sight of her fucking closed door. Or her face, when it gets really bad. He’s there tonight, glad for the warmth of the engine seeping out from under the hood. He’s got his jacket, but the blanket he normally keeps in the boot is in the wash, and it’s really too cold to be sitting outside at midnight at the end of October. His ass is warm, and the backs of his thighs, but everything else is freezing. His nose is tingling already.

But the stars are bright here, and it helps to look at them and try to separate himself from his life. They used to come up here to make out back in college, when they were desperate for some time alone. He puts his palms flat on the hood so that the warmth will sink into them, into his bones. Maybe life is just a thousand different types of desperation all clawing at you to see which one will win.

Maybe it should be over. Maybe it’s time to call it quits and let this type of desperation be the clincher, because he’s not sure if he can keep doing this. It’s exhausting in a way that nobody told him about. Love is supposed to be shared sunsets and mixtapes and sweaty fucking. Not… this. But then, for his Dad, love had been looking out the window for endless hours and always checking the post as soon as it arrived. So maybe it’s just this for him, just the lonely endless sky and the tightness in his shoulders and pausing for a minute outside the door of the flat to breathe. The movies get it all wrong, anyway. Nobody knows shit about anything.

He lies back against the windshield, bends an arm to tuck behind his head and closes his eyes. He wants to work it out in his head, peel back the layers of insults and regrets and see where it started like the books say. Girls see things differently, they say. Find the trigger, they say. Words have impact, they say.

Well, he says it’s all bollocks anyway because all he can remember of the fight is the way she’d hunched over, her mouth open around her angry words. And the way his body burned, the way he could feel all the spiderwebbing veins in him contract with heat. Her hair swings in front of her when she leans over that way, and he’d wanted to wrap his fist in it and shake her until she stopped being such a bitch.

He thumps his head against the windshield and groans, rubbing at his eyes with the heels of his hands. What if there’s no real trigger anymore? What if they’re just bad for each other? What if they’re another type of sickness for her, another unhealthy habit? Could their relationship be another symptom of all her old problems?

He’s bloody well sick of that too, if he’s honest. She can’t help it, can’t really do anything more about it than she’s already doing, and he feels like shit for even letting the words ring in his head. But he’s tired of the secrets and the lies and how fucking impossible it is to get to her, to make her believe anything he says. It’s like throwing stones in a ditch, tossing your best efforts out and watching them sink under the muck at the bottom, ineffective and pointless. He says he loves her, wants her, is crazy about her… but she doesn’t hear any of it. It’s all for shit and it’s so exhausting always chasing after her.

Does he really want his whole life to be chasing after Rae Earl?

The sky is an enormous glittering curtain above him, and if he unfocuses his eyes just right, it wraps around him until the world trembles into nothing more than black flecked with white. Out here in the stillness of a winter midnight, nothing exists but his mind in a field of stars. He stops feeling even the cold. It’s just emptiness.                

Who will he be in ten years if it’s ten more years of this? He’ll be defeated, he thinks. Hunched over himself to lessen the amount of area open to her blows. He’ll be a scab, no longer able to reach out through the scar tissue. No connection to her, no connection to anyone. It’d always be like this moment, the empty space with nothing but himself in it.

Finn shudders, and he’s not sure if it’s the thought of it or the cold getting to his body. He wraps his arms tighter around himself and debates about getting back into the car to turn the heat on. The stars don’t work the same through the windshield, though. He’ll stay here at least a little longer.

He might not make it ten years with her. They might break up in that time, and then where would he be? He’d have given his best years to Rae, his best self. He’d be battered and bruised and old, and he’d have to find some other woman to take the second rate bits of him. She’d be second rate herself, likely. Washed out and timid. He’s not sure he could stand that.

Rae’s always so bright, always keeping him on his toes. She’s quick and fiery and unstable. And for the most part, that’s good. He needs that. If left to his own devices, he’d be profoundly boring and settled, old before his time. If he hadn’t met Rae, with her loud opinions and easy arguments, with the way she’s always made him feel alive… well, he’d probably be married already, with a baby or two and nothing much to say to his pretty wife. He’d be flat, silent, empty.

Is it all emptiness for him, then? Is he just an empty person, and she’s the only thing that fills him in?

He takes that thought with him back into the car, lets it counteract the instant burn from the heater on his numb fingers and cheeks. Who is he without Rae? He tries to answer, tries to pull out some good parts of himself that don’t have her in them. But it’s almost impossible, because she’s a part of almost everything.

She’d been the one to call him quiet and kind, the thing he’s ended up liking best about himself. It’s neither one, or the other, but the pairing, the two of them together. He’s quietly kind, and he doesn’t have to force it, it’s just who he is, and that is maybe the very best thing about him. But he’d never have known that without her.

The music thing is bollocks, because while he’d used to think he’d had superior taste, she’s educated him about all that. He’s not really cool, not the way she is, so that’s not something to hang on to. He likes that he’s funny, but again, that’s impossible to remove from her, because he only knows he’s funny because he can make her laugh. What good is being funny if it’s not to hear Rae giggle? Other girls won’t make him earn it, so he’ll never be able to trust it without Rae.

So, without her…

Without her…

God, he never wants to be without her.

The engine’s already on, but he turns on the headlights, chasing away the chilly blanket of night. He doesn’t need the blankness anymore, doesn’t need the perspective. Without her, that’s all he’d have. Just lots and lots of perspective. So he can’t let it be over. Not yet, not now. He’d so much rather have Rae than perspective.

 _It’s never over_ , he thinks as he makes his way back home. The automatic reply comes quick and unbidden. _My kingdom for a kiss upon her shoulder._ Her back turned to him in bed, her stiff shoulders, her distance. He’s going to kiss that shoulder when he gets home to her, make her turn over so he can see her eyes.

 _It’s never over._ The song keeps playing in his mind, plaintive and mournful. He slams the car door again when he makes it to the parking garage, hurries up the stairs. _All my riches for her smile when I slept so soft against her._ When was the last time they’d curled in on one another, when they’d made the world fade down to the two of them, an island in their bed? When was the last time he woke up with her in his arms?

It’s there outside the door, the pungent stickiness of their fight, but he pushes through it without pausing. It’s worse in the front room, so he tosses his jacket on a chair without stopping and makes his way to the bedroom.

The door isn’t shut, and it’s like a cool breeze cutting through the smog. He goes in and sits down on his side of the bed, one leg still on the floor. He’s still got to brace against it, just in case more comes, but he reaches across the ocean of pillows and blankets and puts a steady hand on her back. _A kiss upon her shoulder._

“Rae.” He says, bolder than a whisper, but still careful and quiet. She doesn’t move. He listens to the steady rhythm of her breath for a minute. “Rae, I want to talk. I know you’re not asleep. You snore when you’re really sleeping.”

“I do not.” She huffs, but her voice is rough and watery. She sniffles.

He shakes her back gently. “Yes, you do. Turn around, baby.”

She makes him wait for it, but it wouldn’t be her if she didn’t. Finally she rolls over and he sees hers red-rimmed eyes, her chapped cheeks, her runny nose, her clutched fistful of tissues. He smiles sadly at her, brushes her hair back from her face, bends to kiss her shoulder over her battered t-shirt. She doesn’t flinch away, like he half thought she would, but she doesn’t lean in either. Just watches him with wounded animal eyes, wide and reflective in the darkness.

“I’m sorry.” He says, and it doesn’t hurt to say it.

“For what?”

“I…” He’s not sure what to do; sometimes this is a trick question, a fuse leading to a bomb around the corner. But he’s tired and he wants her, so the truth will have to do. “For all of it. I’m not sure what we were even fighting about, Rae, but I’m sorry about all of it. I don’t know what’s going on with us, why it’s been like this, but… I’m sorry.”

Again, she waits. She studies his face, looks at his hands, stays expressionless and still. But then it breaks, and she’s curling her body to put her head in his lap, rub her cheek against the denim over his thigh.

“Me too.” She moans, and he curls his fingers in her hair to feel the softness of it, glides his hand down to the tips and then moves it back to the crown of her head to start the sweep again. She nuzzles into his touch. “I’m sorry, Finn. I don’t know either.”

They’re quiet for a while, both thinking as he gently pets her hair. After a minute, he nudges her to move up so that he can lie down beside her, facing her. He toes his boots off over the edge of the bed. Rae smiles as they thump to the floor. He lies next to her, then tangles his legs with hers and pulls her under his arm.

“Do you think maybe…” She starts. “Do you think we’re just bad for each other? Do you think we should just break up? Be done?”

They’re the same thoughts he’s been having all night, but it still hurts to hear them coming from her lips. It’s more real somehow, now that the words are outside his head. It stings like a line of fire down his chest.

“No.” His answer is firm and he touches her cheek and meets her eyes to drive it home. But she’s sad and it occurs to him suddenly that maybe she’s worse with him. Maybe it’s too much for her to always have to fill him up. “I don’t want that, do you want that?”

She shakes her head, but she doesn’t say the words and it’s an agony in him. He asks again, “Do you want that, Rae?”

She moves away, rolls onto her back, and when she answers, it’s to the ceiling instead of him. “I don’t know. I don’t know. This is just… it’s been so hard. I’m tired of fighting.”

“I know.” He’s defeated by the press of her words, by the heaviness of her voice. “I’m tired too.”

Maybe they should just give up, maybe it’s too hard, maybe it’s not fair to her. Maybe it should just be over.

It’s the textured ceiling that swirls in on him this time, not the vastness of space, not the stars. It’s just the ordinary unrelenting cream that all the walls are painted in the flat they’ve lived in for three years. But it’s the same thing in the end, the emptiness. The nothingness that is him.

Slowly, out of pace with the song itself, the lyrics start to reverberate in the emptiness, filling first his head and then the room around him with the pressure. _It’s never over._

“No.” He says again, turning towards her. “I want this, Rae. I want you, I want us. You make me better, you make my life better, even when it’s hard like it has been. Even when we’re fighting. My life is still better with you.”

She turns to him now, and there are fresh tears in her eyes and slipping down her cheeks. He doesn’t brush them away, not yet. “How can you say that? I’m making you miserable, Finn. Me and all my shit.” She chokes up a little, so he reaches to touch her. “I’m ruining your life with all my problems, not making it better.”

“Oh, baby. That’s not true.” He murmurs, and she reaches to clutch at him, pull his body back to press against hers.

“Yes it is! You’re tired and angry because of me. Because I can’t ever stop being crazy and be what you deserve!”

He pulls her in close and she weeps against his chest. He lets her, holds her tight while she lets go. He likes this about himself, too. He can be strong because of her. He feels strong because of her. He’s so much more because of her.

“Listen to me.” He says, pressing a kiss into her hair before pulling back so he can look at her. “Our problems are not because of you.” She starts to protest, but he cuts her off. “They’re not. Rae, they’re not. We have stuff, and it’s not your fault. It’s just stuff.”

He swallows, takes a deep breath and tracks his thumb along the side of her face. “But if you don’t want…”

“I do.” She cuts him off. “I do want. I want us, I want you. I just… how do we do that? How do we have us, just not like this?”

“I don’t know.” He says, frowning a little. She rubs her thumb over his bottom lip. Her breath is sweet and heavy in the space between them. “But I think… maybe just choosing this will help. We both know we want this now. I think we just have to keep picking each other.”

She swallows, raises half her mouth in a tiny smile as she reaches over to pull his lips to hers. The kiss is dry and warm and quick, but reassuring. When she pulls away, she curls her body so that she can rest her cheek against his chest again, so that she’s wrapped in his arms.

“I love you.” She whispers softly, and he squeezes his arms around her for a moment before whispering it back.

She’s sleeping before long, the burn of her tears and emotions wearing her out. She snores softly against his shirt. He lies awake longer, staring at the ceiling, letting it swirl and blur until it surrounds him in nothing once more.

She’s there beside him in the emptiness this time, her body warm and pliant against his side.


End file.
